this is love (this is hell)
by coffee-not-decaf
Summary: He's diagnosed three months, twenty-seven days, and six hours after you get him back.


He's diagnosed three months, twenty-seven days, and six hours after you get him back.

You cry more than he does at the news, because you're the one who knows what it's like to lose him.

"Shh, Merlin, it'll be okay," he whispers into your skin that night as the two of you rock back and forth on your bed – only bed in the flat, and it was only three months ago that, for the first time, he curled up into your side and stayed next to you, holding you, all night long.

He had only just come back.

You were supposed to have_ time _in this life, that was what was promised to you, that was what you were waiting for, was a life with him, all you ever wanted, what you lived through countless centuries for, all blown away by the cancer cells growing in his brain.

"I'll fix it, I'll fix you," you tell him, pressing sloppy kisses onto his jawline and neck, and it was two months, seventeen days, and one hour since he let you do that, since you told him you had always loved him and always would. "You're going to live forever."

"No, darling, that's you," is Arthur's only response as he leans into your touch.

You go to all the doctor's appointments, all the meetings where professionals tell you about their 'miracle cures' and you nod and smile because Arthur looks hopeful, looks hopeful instead of sick and tired, which is all he's been these days, and god, this tumor is killing him and killing you and everyone is just going to end up dead.

Except you can't die.

So you kiss Arthur's forehead and scream and shout and sob when he can't see you.

"I'll find a cure," you tell him every morning, every afternoon, every evening. "I'll find a cure, I have to be able to."

"It's okay," Arthur says quietly, brushing hair out of your eyes, because you've let it grow since your days in Camelot, and sometimes bangs tickle your eyelids. Arthur always smiled when they do. "It's okay if you can't."

"No, it's not, I have to be able to – it's only cancer, and I'm – if I can't help you, then who can?"

"All your magic," a rueful smile on Arthur's face. "And you can't save my life."

"Stop it," you say, and it's too sharp, too hard. The smile drops from Arthur's features and you sit in silence for the rest of the night.

Arthur gets paler, more ill, more drawn, by the day (hour, minute, second), and it's a wonder that you haven't exploded out of sheer frustration yet. You've had him back for five months, one day, and seventeen hours, and it's not enough, it will never be enough.

He's your person, he's your forever, and he's back – You can't just let him sink back into the abyss.

"You're overworking yourself," comes Arthur's quiet rasp from the bed where he lays, looking like death itself; you pace back and forth across the bedroom, tearing your hair out as something unnamable eats your insides.

You chuckle humorlessly. "Never thought I'd hear that."

"Never thought I'd say it," Arthur smiles at you, soft on the edges, and you sink down into bed next to him and wind your arms around his stomach and kiss the spots where his hair meets his skin.

"I love you," you say, and you feel his body relax and his breathing slow as he falls asleep beneath you.

You hate it when he sleeps.

It's too much like death.

"I'm not going to lose you," you whisper. "I can't."

Your hand cups Arthur's face as you kneel next to his bed in the stark, white hospital room. It's too late, it's far too late, medical or magical, it's too late.

You failed.

Again.

"Merlin," he says, croaks rather, and you hush him immediately. He can't strain himself; he has to stay as long as he can, every second more precious than the last.

"Save your breath," you lean down to press your foreheads together. You feel a contented huff of air against your neck.

"I love you," he breathes and the words send a shudder down your entire body. "I didn't say it the last time. I wanted to, but I didn't. Forgive me?"

"Always," is the only word you can say as you reach down to hold his clammy, icy hand with your own.

You feel Arthur smile as you rasp "Stay with me."

He closes his eyes.

You lose him six months, twelve days, and two hours after you found him again.

You tear up your flat, rip out the floorboards and cave in the ceiling, erasing and removing any evidence that he was ever there at all, that you ever held him, kissed him, loved him, had him there with you –

You leave London behind for America and don't look back.

You'd kill yourself if you could, but you wouldn't be fooling anyone. The knives may go through your skin, the pills may pass through your body, the bullet might blow out your brains, but you would be fine, in the end. You always are.

There had only ever been one constant in your life, and that was Arthur. The steady thrum of him beneath your skin, the lingering thought of him every morning when you woke, the quiet love you shared in Camelot and in London – but that was gone now, because there was nothing left, nothing left of him and nothing left of you.

You had always tried your hardest to remember Camelot as best you could.

But now, now that it's over and done, now that Arthur came and went, now that everything you were was ripped to shred, now that you learned your life meant absolutely nothing –

Now it was time to forget.

You had already lived so many lives – It was time for a new one.

"I love you," you whisper to him, wherever he is, and hope he hears you.

You won't be saying it again.


End file.
